(Names have been concealed in order to protect the missionaries.)

Taiwan: September 21, 1999

At 1:47 a.m., Tuesday morning, we awoke to the terrible loud noise of our windows shaking and the building groaning and the earth rattling. Yes! The sound was terrifying. We could hear the earth rattling as it quaked. Our bed was shaking violently. Our immediate thought was to get away from the windows, so we dove off the bed toward the children, who sleep about 15 feet from us on mats on the floor. Walking was impossible. The floor rolled like the ocean, and the earth tossed us back and forth. We fell on the mats with the children, waking them up. Then the electricity went off. Outside, which is always lit up by signs and red lanterns, was now pitch black. The initial shaking lasted one whole minute. When it stopped, J began to shout up to our nanny, who sleeps on the third floor. There was no answer. He shouted again and again. Finally she answered back that she was OK. She came down the stairs and joined us.

We put on some clothes and headed down the stairs. Our oldest daughter was staying overnight at our friend’s house, so we were concerned about her. Our other two children, our nanny and I positioned ourselves on the first floor, thinking it might be safer than the second, while J ran down the street to check on our daughter. While he was gone, the earth began to shake again. Again, it was violent. We ran into the bathroom and stayed there. Four or five times the earth quaked like this, one time even throwing me to the floor.

The neighbors began to come out and many were very distressed, panicking. J stood in the street looking for a way to call our friends, as their big electric door was down. One family allowed him to pray with them in Jesus’ name. They were terribly frightened. Many of the other neighbors were jumping in their cars. They were running, but to where we couldn’t guess. No place would be safe.

After a while, J returned and suggested that we all go outside. If more quakes came, the house could crumble. All of the neighbors headed for an open lot across from our house. Our friend brought our daughter down to us. She was unharmed. We sat out in the empty lot for about two hours, again and again feeling the ground shift.

Eventually, we decided the worst was over and headed back into our home. There was no light at all, so it was difficult to get the children back to bed. After we had just gotten situated, the building began to shake again.

Wednesday, September 22

All day Tuesday, about every 5-10 minutes, another aftershock hit. Our legs have turned to jelly. The ground has become unstable. You can feel it especially on the second and third floors. The ground is like water. It’s almost like it sloshes back and forth. We are left feeling like we have sea legs.

The damage all around us is extensive. We had no electricity and no water all day Tuesday. The neighbors all closed their shops, and we have all relived the stories over and over.

Our electricity returned late Tuesday night, but we still have no water. We were able to watch television today and see the scope of the devastation. The pictures are terrifying. People buried under buildings all over Taichung and Taipei. Large apartment buildings of 20 stories have collapsed. In many cases the first few floors of tall buildings collapsed down upon one another, crushing all the people. People frantically looking for their loved ones in the rubble heaps. Dead bodies covered with blankets with family members next to them weeping and burning incense and paper spirit money. Piles of spirit money being burned next to piles of rubble that cover dead bodies. The worst damage and the most deaths have been here in our county, Taichung. About 10 miles from our house the road lifted up to the second-story level and buildings are collapsed. This evening the death toll is around 2,000 with about 3,000 more buried either alive or dead, unreachable under the rubble.

During the night we had two more large aftershocks. It was hard to sleep, knowing that another one could come any minute. This morning at about 8:40 we had another jolt called an aftershock, but it registered at 6.8 on the Richter scale. Again, the ground rumbled and the building shook all around us as we ran into the bathroom. About 15 minutes later another large one came. Our oldest daughter has been especially full of fear throughout this event. She immediately began to cry.

The initial earthquake measured 7.6 on the Richter scale, and was the first of thousands of earthquakes to hit the island of Taiwan over the following months.

J wrote: During this trauma, we are very aware of God’s presence and His peace during these days of danger. Many doors have opened for ministry to so many hurting people. Tremors continue to shake our world. We have the overwhelming feeling that the ground is like liquid beneath our feet. We have several big ones every day. Buildings continue to collapse…and yes a few more people miraculously have survived and been pulled from the rubble. Taiwan’s infrastructure is a mess. . . roads, sewers, dams, reservoirs, electricity, etc.

Continue to pray for the more than 100,000 people who are homeless, many of them only ten minutes from our front door. This week J and I surveyed the quake stricken region immediately east of us. I am still shocked at the vast devastation. Thousands of homeless living on the streets. Giant buildings toppled over on their sides as though they were toys carelessly tossed aside into a pile. We are still in wonder as to how our particular village survived with only a few collapsed structures. If you were to look at a map detailing the destructive path of the earthquake, it makes a straight line through our house and the homes of our missionaries. It is almost as though the earthquake skipped us and went to the next village, where several large apartments collapsed, and numerous homes were wiped out.

What were we doing in Taiwan anyway?

This was the first of hopefully many Heart of God Ministries trips to Taiwan after the annual boot camp. The goal of this trip, and planned subsequent trips, is to establish the boot camp graduates who are planning to go to China, to make sure they have places to live and help them in their language study. As the first of its kind, we also intended to set up a base that would be a permanent place that missionaries headed to China could pass through for language study.

This first group included one staff family and two other families with children and one single, young man. The missionaries had settled into homes and had begun to learn the language. How did they do that? Through LAMP, Language Acquisition Made Practical. It is a method of language learning that gets the students into the community and culture, meeting people and building relationships. The people on one’s route become tutors, as the pupil allows himself to be humbled and teachable. R. G. said, “Each day as part of my language learning I spend two to three hours speaking to about 18 people. Every morning I study a text of four or five sentences with a few new words. I practice saying them to the people that I meet who work in shops on a road near an outside market.”

Though the missionaries had only been there two months when the earthquake struck, because these “routes” had been established, each missionary had approximately 15-20 Chinese families with whom they had already developed relationship. On the day of the devastation and loss and terrible fear, our missionaries were able to pray for people and talk to them about the hope that is available through Jesus. They would ask how the people were sleeping and upon hearing their anxiety, they offered knowledge of the only One who could calm their fears and bring them peace.

One of our missionary families began a daily visit to the many tent cities. Although their language capabilities were still limited, they allowed their children to play with the children who had lost their homes, and they offered comfort and prayer for the adults who were terrified and exhausted. God is using our missionaries in wonderful ways.

The Water from God!

The electricity was restored fairly quickly, but the whole village was without water, and it was said that it would be this way indefinitely while they fix the dam that was severely cracked by the earthquake. Another aspect of God’s sovereign plan: some of our staff were living in the house that has become the HGM China base there in Taiwan.

J wrote: “The house that God gave us to use as a base has a water well! We have the only well in the village! We posted a sign with the scriptures from the woman at the well and other scriptures that refer to Jesus as the Living Water. The people read them as their buckets fill. We have had many spiritual conversations with the people of the village. They are full of fear. We have been very frank that their idols cannot save them from this devastation. Many have agreed with us and have shown much interest in Jesus. We see God’s hand in the midst of this horrible event.”

Talk about a missionary’s dream! Our missionaries had a captive audience! They were meeting so many people who would never have been within reach if this had not happened. They saw approximately 1000 people a day come to their door to receive water! Ladies washed their clothes on old-style washboards out under the faucet, and one woman even came to wash her hair.

J wrote: “The only source of water in the center of our village is HGM’s China base! I know J already wrote and told everyone about it, but I just have to again exclaim how wonderfully great it is to be in the center of His plan. So often we have to wait years to see the fruit of obedience, this has been less than two months! When we first saw the building, J and I knew we were to get it. So many keep commenting how strange it is that we are the only ones with water. They are in amazement. Literally the village is at our door from dawn until past midnight. One man came up to me this morning and said that we were the new heart of our village, Si Jiang Li. Oh that it were true. That they would all have the new heart that only Jesus can give them!”

October 25, 1999

(one month after the first quake)

J wrote: “I do not think that humans were meant to become experts in earthquakes experientially. I now have enough experience to get the epicenters directionally pegged, the magnitudes within a couple points. It is spooky how accurate you can become after a month of daily experience... Saturday night we were lying in bed and another one hit. Instantly your heart is pounding. We got hit with another major quake (6.4) two days ago. It was unrelated to the one we had a month ago (7.6). It was a different fault line, under a different city. Hundreds are injured, buildings collapsed, people re-terrorized.

Every day I meet many Taiwanese who are exhausted from lack of sleep. Every town has tent cities of people too scared to return home or whose homes are destroyed. Just yesterday morning we had nine major earthquakes (aftershocks). Here was our morning:

1:08 a.m.     5.2

2:29 a.m.     4.2

5:10 a.m.     5.15

5:53 a.m.     4.8

6:06 a.m.     4.8

6:09 a.m.     4.2

6:35 a.m.     4.7

10:39 a.m.   4.9

11:07 a.m.   4.9

I am not counting the little ones. These are the aftershocks that make you stop all conversation and wonder how big it will get. I walk around a little seasick everyday just from the constant shaking.”

Earthquake Fruit

October 31: J said, “It is the beginning of the crumbling of the idolatry here in our village! An elderly couple on our street has just decided to follow Jesus!

We have known that they have been considering Jesus for the last couple weeks, but today J went over to visit them and the elderly lady grabbed his arm and said, ‘Jesus is my Lord.’ We are excited! They have not yet burned their idols and are really just beginning to understand what it even means to be Christian, but the light of Jesus is in their eyes, and we are thrilled! We expect much more fruit. This is why we are in Taiwan. Pray for us for more fruit and that King Jesus will receive the reward of His suffering!”

Hannah Wahlgren is a freelance writer from Enid, Okla. She is waiting on the Lord for His timing regarding overseas work and serving where she is now.